They Are Still Just Kids After All

[Unkotare]

I have mentioned a few times that among the classes I teach are the highest level ESL students in the school. They are usually juniors or seniors, and are at the point that some of them sort of resent still having language support at all (but it is easy to offer communicative tasks that reveal how much they still need to develop their academic language skills). They are also at an age where they are experimenting with "teenager" ways of trying to mask insecurity like feigned indifference to everything, hostility, or trying to look "tough." The last one often has some very unfortunate consequences, and is why certain loser racists who post on USMB are so scared of them. However, when it comes right down to it they are still just kids and given the right circumstances will still act like kids. It's good to see because there will be plenty of time to become legitimately world-weary in their futures.

 

[Unkotare]

I usually get the "behaviorally difficult" kids, and many of them are extra large. Well-practiced at scowling, and disliked/feared by most of the other teachers. Certain broken loser racist cowards who post around here would piss himself and feint dead away crossing one of these kids on the street. But I tell you, a girl in my last class today jokingly asked if they could decorate my classroom for Christmas today expecting I would snap "no! stop being ridiculous" at them. To their surprise, I (after pausing for dramatic effect) said "sure, why not?" A room full of kids who moments before had been holding "I hate you/I don't care about anything/I'm a badass" poses, jumped up and started acting like actual kids again. They knew where to find the supplies I sometimes use for projects with my beginner freshmen classes, and they started using them. Before you know it, some were sitting on the floor with poster paper and colored markers, putting sentence strips along the top of the walls, and clipping copier paper one boy with scars on his face who was regularly suspended for fighting used scissors to make into snow flakes that were soon decorating the walls all around the classroom. By the end of the class there was a giant, colorful snowman hanging on the wall behind my desk, a "Drip Clau$" Santa on the door, and a really terrible drawing of a Christmas tree pinned to the board at the back of the class. They had spent the period working and laughing together - in English, singing Christmas songs very badly, and being happy to be in school for a while. At a time when attendance is one of the most serious challenges facing public education, these kids looking forward to coming to class next week is not a bad thing. Just now I saw that at least a dozen of the kids in that very class had submitted the essay we were working on via the online platform we use.

 

[Unkotare]

One of the funniest parts of parent-teacher night is the look on the kids faces when they show up in class the next day. The "oh no, what did they say?" look is priceless.